The Programmable Thermostat

This past Wednesday I went to Home Depot and bought a programmable thermostat. I was going to install it, but made the mistake of e-mailing my landlord about it as a courtesy.

To which he freaked out.

I was seriously regretting forgetting that it is easier to beg forgiveness than ask permission. *sigh* However, after some e-mails back and forth, he was over today to look at it... and he installed it! YAYAY!

Since it was 40 outside when I woke up this morning and a nippy 63 degrees in my apartment, I think I'll be using the heat sooner than I anticipated. (If it dips below 60 inside during waking hours, the heat is ON.)

I haven't needed the heat or the air for a few weeks, but I'm looking forward to the prospect of getting to program the thermostat to keep me comfortable!

The iRobot Service Department

When I finally opened the box to my Roomba, I was really excited to get started. I wanted to set up the invisible walls and get my living room vacuumed because it NEEDED to be vacuumed. As I'm checking the Roomba's moving parts and making sure that I know how to clean the brushes, one of the pieces snaps. Broken. Arg.

I registered my Roomba on their website and then placed a request with iRobot for a new part since OBVIOUSLY it was defective and NOT MY FAULT. I was prepared to go back and forth with many e-mails and phone calls on this subject. The first response I got from iRobot was very polite, apologized for the defective piece, and informed me that a replacement was already in the mail. This was all on a SUNDAY! Beautiful.

The only catch? They sent it via UPS. I had never had anything shipped to the apartment via UPS, so I was wary. The following Tuesday, I had a knock on my door. It was the UPS guy. He had the new part for my Roomba. He left in such a hurry, I don't know how he got in the building!! Maybe he has a key? (which would be weird) Maybe a neighbor let him in? (which would be doubtful) I still have no idea.

The Bakery Discount Store

I'm not really sure where this sort of store comes from or how you can search for one near you, but if you can find one, they are really amazing. My experience is only based on going to 2 different stores in 2 different states, so your mileage my vary.

On to the tale!

I have never been one to pass up a deal. When I lived in Rochester, Minnesota I was lured into the local Bakery Discount store by huge signs that proclaimed half price baked goods. Sounds too good to be true? Not really. I just had a similar experience here. There is a bakery discount store about half a mile from my apartment. I had been meaning to visit there for a few months (even more since it is close to my job as well), but they seem to only be open very short hours and never when I was thinking about stopping in.

Not so today. Although the place looks a little shady and is set back from the road more than the other stores around, once I had parked and entered, the store was clean and non-shady on the inside. The best part? Tons of signs that said "$1 each" or "50% off marked price" These words are beautiful to me.

I ended up getting bags of tortilla chips - a local brand that I trust - for $1 each. I can go through a bag of these a week when I eat them with a taco salad, so this is definitely a good thing.

I also got salsa (2/$5) which was on my shopping list for this week. The price was comparable to what I pay in the grocery store when salsa is on sale - and the jars were larger.

I managed to get through the cookie aisles with only a few things - all trusted brands (safeway and a few local brands) and all items that I was thinking about buying at the grocery store this week.

The last thing that I bought was actually an investment in my career - donuts to bring in to the office. They are seconds from a local bakery that is pretty well known in the area for very good donuts. The price was less than $3 for a baker's dozen. And my co-workers are extra happy with me today, which will make my life easier during the rest of the week.

You can look forward to a post about my Roomba and one about my couch in the coming days...

The Mail, a follow-up

(Note: This post is a follow-up to the post entitled The Mail. You may want to read it first.)

I brought the bag of mail to the post office and the postal worker behind the counter said he would do what he could. The next few days, the mail for the previous tenant stopped, but then it started up again. I did some research and found that not only is it a federal offense to open someone else's mail, but it is also a federal offense to dispose of someone else's mail. So, what's a girl to do? Well, here's the information I found at usps.com:

For other misdelivered mail items (such as letters):

• If the mailpiece is delivered to the wrong location:
  • Don't erase or mark over the information, or write any type of endorsement on the mailpiece.
  • Place the item back in the mailbox or hand the item back to your mailperson.
• If the mailpiece is delivered to the correct location but the recipient on the mailpiece does not reside at the address:
  • Write "Not at this address" on mailpiece.
  • Don't erase or mark over the address.
  • Provide the mailpiece to your mailperson or drop into a Collection Box® receptacle.

Along with the mail marked "Not at this address" I also put a note explaining the situation to the mailperson (apparently this is what they want to be called?) and letting them know that I am the new current resident. I haven't had any misdelivered mail since!

The FedEx Problem (and the Solution)

Last week, there was a Woot-Off at Woot.com. For those of you not familiar with Woot, they normally sell one item a day until it sells out. At midnight CST, they put a new item up for sale. Items for sale range greatly, but usually are electronic in nature. During a Woot-Off, when an item sells out, a new item is put up for sale. Sometimes items sell out within a matter of seconds. It can be quite addicting.

Anyway, during the last Woot-Off, I purchased an iRobot Roomba 4296 Remote Scheduler Robotic Vacuum. Vacuuming is one of my least favourite tasks, so having a robot to do it for me is especially exciting. Unfortunately, Woot is currently shipping via FedEx. I didn't realize this until I received my order tracking information in my e-mail inbox yesterday. There is nowhere at my apartment for FedEx to leave this package, so I gave their customer service department a call.

I had researched on their website that they do have a "hold at location" option available so I asked if I could have this done. Unfortunately (again), since the item was shipped FedEx Ground, the closest pick-up location is an hour and a half away. Driving that far (3 hours round trip) is just not an option. I asked if there was any way that I could have the shipping address changed to my work address. Of course, I could not do this through FedEx, the original shipper was the only one who could do this.

Fortunately, Woot's customer service e-mail address must be checked by approximately 1,000 trained monkeys, because I received an e-mail saying that they had changed the address with FedEx within an hour of my original e-mail being sent! YAY!

Note to self: When ordering from Woot in the future, list my work address as the shipping address.

The Waiting

You may have noticed my lack of posting in the last week (or maybe you haven't). This was due to the fact that I went completely off-line so as not to be spoiled before I received my copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I ordered my copy from Amazon.com and it was to arrive on Saturday, July 21st - money back guarantee! The only catch - my mailbox isn't exactly huge, and there is no place for the postal delivery person to leave packages. My only choice was to watch out the window all morning for the mail delivery truck and go outside and get my box when it arrived.

Unfortunately, there is no way to predict when the mail will arrive - especially on a high shipping volume weekend. So, I watched and I waited. I decided that the mail would probably not come until after 9:30am, so I did sleep in a bit. Then, I had to figure out some things to do in the kitchen (so I could watch out the window). First I did the dishes from the night before, then I packaged up the bulk chicken I bought so that I could freeze it. I started running out of things to do, and then I decided to make brownies! My first dessert baking in the apartment! I used a mix, but I didn't have anything to grease the pan with, so they ended up sticking pretty badly. Just as I was putting the brownies into the oven, the mail came!

The postal woman was very nice and when she saw me standing by the mailbox, she guessed right away which package was mine. It was great that I was able to be productive before my 12 hour reading marathon!

The Pots and Pans

Last night, my boyfriend and I went to Kohl's because I need pots and pans and they had them on sale. This was listed in the circular for the week:
Farberware® 15-pc. Classic Cookware Set plus Bonus
$99.99
Reg. $199.99
thru Jul 22
BONUS 11”/4.5-qt. DEEP COVERED SAUTE PAN with the purchase of a Farberware® 15-pc. Classic cookware set. A $79.99 value.

Now, in this case, "BONUS" is synonymous with "FREE", don't you think? Anyway, it took us a little while to find it in the store and then lug the 2 boxes to the front counter (thank goodness I brought the slave-labor boyfriend along). The cashier rings it up, and proclaims, "That will be $155.98" My "bonus" gift had rung up as $55.99.

Sigh. Why must I do all the work? I had her check the circular (which, she flipped through every page knowing full well that the kitchenware is on page 47 out of 50) and of course, she was further confused by the wording. So, she calls over her supervisor and they look at it together. Turns out you have to do something special in the register (press "free gift") that our cashier didn't know about. Apparently, she'd been ringing up the "free gift" luggage sales all day, as well.

And this is why it pays to know what you're buying and how much you are supposed to be paying for it!

The Walk

One of the reasons I chose to move into the apartment that I did, was due to it's close proximity to my place of work. Ever since I left college life, I have missed having the option of walking places. I'm not really one for walking just for the sake of walking, but to have a destination and a purpose makes a big difference for me. Unfortunately, the HEAT here lately has been rather unbearable (I am, in general, a cold weather person), but I promised myself if the high temperature for the day is under 86 degrees F, then walking it is!

Today was the third time I walked to work. It looks like I'll be able to walk tomorrow as well (thank goodness for a "cold front"). My walk takes me out of our little development, down a rather steep hill to the main street where my office is. The whole walk to work probably takes 5-7 minutes, while the walk home takes about twice that long due to the hill and me being out of shape.

This morning, I saw approximately 50 pieces of trash. I would say that 90% of that trash was tossed out of car windows. I will never understand how people can be so piggish. I did pick up a Coke bottle because, like those commercials for www.mycokerewards.com, I saw a Blockbuster DVD laying on the side of the road. Tomorrow, however, I will definitely be bringing a trash bag to pick up trash - even if it doesn't get me 3 points closer to a free movie rental.

The 3 foot receipt

Last night after work, I went to one of the local grocery stores. I had seen the circular and there were a lot of buy-one-get-one-free deals and I wanted to check it out. The problem with buy-one-get-one-free deals is that if the item's price is way too high to begin with, you aren't really getting much of a deal. I grew up in a family where we didn't buy anything unless it was on sale AND we had a coupon AND it was double coupon day. So, this trip to the grocery store involved lots of calculations on my cell phone.

Even though I have no pantry space and no place to put dry goods in my kitchen, I filled my cart. FILLED. I got 12 boxes of pasta ($0.50 each), but I won't be able to cook any of it since I still do not have any pots and pans. I got 4 packages of hot dogs (brand name, $1.50 each), but no hot dog buns (they were not on sale). I got 8 2-liter bottles of Vanilla Coke Zero ($0.79 each - yum). And that's just a cross section of my purchases.

What really got me was when I was paying at the cashier. The woman ringing me up said to me, "You saved 35 dollars! ................. your total is $89.30" I felt bad after I laughed at her. I had to spend 90 bucks to save 35? How did they rope me into that deal?

I guess I'm just a sucker for a sale. On the plus side, I won't need to buy pasta for a good 6-months and I certainly got a good work-out carrying all of it up to my 2nd story apartment in the 90 degree weather.

The Outlet Situation

I am having a bit of a problem figuring out the best way to light my bedroom. There is no overhead lighting, and the outlet that is attached to the light switch is in a most unfortunate place. I understand why they did it this way, of course - it was the cheapest way to wire the room.

Right now, I have no lighting attached to the switch-controlled outlet because it just doesn't make any sense to put something there; it's a walking path for goodness sakes! So, I have to either a) walk through a dark room to turn on the lamp next to the bed or, b) turn on the light before it gets dark and leave it on until I go to sleep. Both have their downsides, but I would rather have to make that choice than have an extension cord across the doorway (or over the door - eew, not aesthetically pleasing at all). If anyone has a suggestion or solution, please leave me a comment!

I fear I was completely spoiled by living in my parents house where the top outlet on every outlet plate in a room was wired to the switch. Yes, I am spoiled.

The Laundry

I did laundry in my apartment for the first time last night. It wasn't all that exciting, but I did learn a few things.

• During the spin cycle, my washer vibrates the entire apartment building. (This is only a slight exaggeration)
• The washer does not beep when the cycle is completed.
  
• The dryer beeps for 5 minutes and then starts a "wrinkle release" tumble cycle and then beeps for 5 minutes and repeats the cycle until you open the door.
• The stop for the lid for the washer is gone. This means that when the lid is open, the washer cycle knob gets pushed in and the cycle stops. Fun.

Most of my blouses for work need to be hung to dry. Since the laundry is in the kitchen, there really isn't any place for me to hang stuff. So, I put everything on hangers, hung them over the shower rod, and left the bathroom fan on. This morning my clothes were nice and dry! Oh, sometimes I am so smart.

The Previous Tenant

Well, I talked to my landlord about the situation with the previous tenant's mail. Turns out, the previous tenant (from now on known as PT) skipped town. He owes money to my landlord, and considering the number of overdue notices in my mailbox, he owes money to quite a few people. Having these bills and letters in my possession was making me very uneasy.

I went to the post office this afternoon with a large bag full of mail addressed to the PT and explained the situation to the postal worker. He was very understanding and said he'd do his best to make sure that the PT's mail won't be delivered anymore, but he couldn't make any promises.

Hopefully, this will be the last of the barrage of unwanted mail. Although, I wouldn't mind if his magazine subscriptions kept coming!

The Shower head

Earlier this week, my shower head broke. It wasn't the absolute end of the world, because I could still use the hand-held part, but I couldn't hook it to the wall anymore to take a normal shower. Taking a shower the past few days involved lots of picking up and putting down the shower head. Not exactly the fastest or easiest way to take a shower. I decided that, rather than have the landlord replace it with some random thing, I should do it myself. This way, I could pick out a shower head with some features I like and I could have a nice shower sooner than later.

I removed the old shower head Friday morning, thinking that I would go shopping for a new one after work. Well, that didn't happen, so I showered minus a shower head on Saturday morning. Wasn't completely horrible, but it wasn't exactly a comfortable shower since the water wasn't being channeled at all; it was just spurting out like crazy.

Last night, however, I went to the local Wal*Mart Super Store and picked out a $18 shower head. I was debating going for the $9.95 shower head, but I figured for another $8, there was less of a chance of it breaking in the first month of use. It was easy enough to install, but my boyfriend ended up doing it for me. Ahhh, just mention the use of tools to a man, and he's right there (all that was needed was an adjustable wrench).

My shower this morning was rather delightful and quick (even though I spent a few minutes fiddling with the fun massager settings).

The Microwave

Editor's Note: I have told this story twice so far, both times in long-winded detail. I have a feeling that this third time will be no different. Brace yourself.

Pre-move, I purchased a microwave from Best Buy. I did this without considering the size of the space that I had to put the microwave. Thus, the microwave did not fit. It was too large in all directions. Bah. Of course, said store is across town and not particularly on my way anywhere, so I put the microwave box in the trunk and hoped to pass by Best Buy in the near future.

Meanwhile, I am without a microwave. This is not a happy thing. You would not believe the amount of things you miss being able to do when you are microwave-less. I decided to check out the on-line Independence Day circulars for our local stores. I ended up finding a great Emerson microwave in the circular for Target. On Monday, I went to the Target I normally go to and found the microwave on the shelf. Then, I realized they only had the RED ones out. Of course, I wanted the Stainless Steel, not the RED. So, then I had to go and look for an associate. I looked for 20 minutes and did not find anyone. I had some place else to be, so I measured the microwave so I could be sure it will fit in my kitchen and then I left.

Tuesday, I tried again at a different Target. I found the microwaves on the shelf, and the only ones they had out were the RED ones. Then, I removed the tag from the shelf and found one of their little price-scan machines. I scanned it in and, VOILA, the machine informed me that there were some stainless steal ones in-stock.

Armed with this information, I found an associate who said he would find me an associate. When the second associate showed up, she had a hand-held machine for checking inventory. This machine told her there were none in stock. I explained to her that the microwaves had only been on sale for 2 days and the fact that they were out of stock was a little ridiculous. I urged her to check again since the OTHER machine said they had some. So, associate #2 calls associate #3 and he calls someone in the back and they look for it in their super-inventory-computer. We are then informed that there are none in the stock room, but there are some on the truck. This is the truck that they are not allowed to unload until the next day.

So, then I go to customer service and have them write me a rain check (I was leaving the store with SOMETHING DAMMIT). This process also took about 15 minutes. All in all, I spent an hour in Target on Tuesday without buying anything.

WEDNESDAY, I CALL the first Target that I went to and, with rain check in hand, provide them with the product number and ask if there are any in-stock. The associate that spoke with went and looked on the shelf and said there were five. I asked him politely if it would be possible to have one labeled with my name and held at customer service. He did. Then, I drove to Target, paid for the stinking microwave, and left.

After all of this, I went to Best Buy and returned the original microwave that I purchased. The return process took less than 5 minutes.


NOTE TO STORES: You should really make it easier for people to BUY STUFF from you than to RETURN STUFF. Really. This should be common sense.

OH, and PS the new microwave is snazzy and works very nicely. It will be great for heating up my frozen food.

The Frozen Food Aisle

First, a bit of advice, if you go grocery shopping around midnight and you plan on lingering in the frozen food aisle, consider bringing a jacket.

I'm almost convinced that my local store turns off the heating (as well as most of the lights) in the frozen food aisles at night. Makes sense since there are way less customers and it is a good way to conserve energy, but freezing customers are not happy customers.

But I digress.

I like to cook. I also like to think I'm pretty good at it. So, when I was thinking about my first week of meals in my apartment, I was thinking of fun things like casseroles, roasts, pastas, and fish fillets. However, now that the move has been completed, I'm realizing that this is more of a dream to be fulfilled at a much later date. I still don't have any pots and pans (well, I have a 1 quart pot without a lid). I have a toaster oven and a George Foreman grill. Oh, and no space in the kitchen to put dry groceries. Oops.

Last night in the bowels of the frozen food aisle, I went a little crazy. It was fortunate that I had taken the smaller size of shopping cart when I entered the store, because I fear I would have bought way more than 8 boxes of hot pockets, 7 banquet meals, 4 boxes of chicken fingers, and 4 frozen pizzas. They were all on sale, what can I say?

The dream of a gourmet meal was spotted fleeing the scene.

The Mail

You would think that checking your mailbox for the first time, on the day before your lease starts, would prove to be rather fruitless. However, if neither the previous tenant nor the tenant before him stopped their mail, you may find that there is a month's worth of junk mail, free newspapers, bills and tax documents in the mailbox so that it is almost bursting at the seams.

I don't mind the junk mail, the free coupons, and the newspapers so much, but the bills and tax documents I find some what distressing. I feel like they must be important enough to try to get them to the addressee in some way, but at the same time, if he didn't feel the need to file the appropriate paper work to have his mail forwarded, why should I care either? Then there's the possibility that he DID file the paperwork, but the post office is just delivering the mail anyway for the heck of it.

So what to do with all of it? Well, I put it in a bag and I'm going to go to the post office sometime this week and see what they think. If that doesn't get me anywhere, I am going to give it to my landlord and let him deal with it. Hopefully that is close to the proper etiquette for the situation, but I don't think Miss Manners ever wrote on the subject, so we may never know.

The Cable Guy

Sadly, he arrived in the designated window for my "appointment." This means that I don't get the nice $40 credit that they promise if they are late. Normally I applaud people for being on time, but this was not one of those cases. It was a rather silly exercise due to the fact that I have no furniture, and certainly no TV. I think all he did was plug in the cable box (which I only got because it's $2 a month and ordering cut my installation fees in half), program the clock on the darn thing, and call someone to tell them to flip the switch. Ahhh.... to have that challenging job! Also, he wasn't able to do some of the testing they do since... I had no TV for him to test with. It was probably easier this way, however, since I am going to be using my Pinnacle PCTV Pro USB 2.0 Analog TV Tuner w/Remote. When I try to explain this to anyone, they become extremely confused and start asking lots of questions which are completely irrelevant. Today's conversation with the cable guy was no different. It went something like this:

Cable Guy: So, here's the remote. I'd program it for your TV, but it's not here. Do you know what kind of TV you have?
Me: I don't need to program that remote, I have my own.
Cable Guy: But I can program it for you! Is it a ****? A ********?
(He keeps listing brands until I stop him)
Me: No, see, I don't have a TV.
Cable Guy: *CONFUSION*
Me: (sigh - so much for my non-disclosure plan) I'm planning on watching TV through my computer. I have a TV Tuner in my computer.
Cable Guy: Then why do you need cable?
Me: Because how can I watch TV without it?
Cable Guy: With your computer.
Me: (I am silently screaming) It's complicated. I don't need to program that remote. It will work the cable box the way it is, correct?
Cable Guy: Yeah.
Me: Okay. (Refrains from throttling him)


Sigh. Fortunately, I don't think I have to go through that again. And I can return the Cable Box with the Remote-that-is-not-programmed-to-my-TV-since-I-don't-have-one after my first bill. The things I do to save $25.

The Keys

Holding these shiny keys in my hand makes my heart leap. And my stomach twitter. I don't know exactly why. Probably due to the fact that this is my first space that I can call my own. It's not just an extra room in someone's house. I get each and every room to myself. Unless I feel like letting someone in. Ahh... the feeling of power, independence, and privacy!